The Metroid series has been around for 25 years. Ars looks back at what made …

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This year marks the 25th anniversary of the Metroid series of games, and Nintendo is celebrating in muted style. Nintendo of America's official Twitter account reminded us to log into the 3DS e-shop to download the free version of Metroid Fusion we were promised as ambassadors, but that was it. Fans took to the cause with gusto, however, and a wave of fan-made art and musical projects have spread across the Internet.

Nintendo's lack of enthusiasm for one of its core franchises isn't surprising; Metroid has always been an odd duck among the company's games. Besides, Nintendo is busy worrying over the success, or lack thereof, for the 3DS and paving the way for the upcoming Wii U.

No new Metroid games have been announced, but the upside is that Metroid remains one of the few series that Nintendo has not beaten into the ground. That's just fine: the game's hero, Samus Aran, has always been a loner.

Her name is Samus Aran

The original Metroid, released in 1986 on the NES and making an immediate splash in the United States, was built on well-known influences. Every game stands on the shoulders of the titles that came before it, but Metroid took games of the time and mixed them together to create something new and amazing. The game had the platforming elements of the Mario series and the non-linear exploration aspect of Legend of Zelda. You had to explore the environment to unlock new weapons and abilities, which would then help you explore even further to fight the increasingly powerful enemies put in your path.

It wasn't a sunny game, and you sure as hell weren't fighting turtles or the cute little enemies from Legend of Zelda. The game made you feel alone in a hostile environment filled with native life forms that wanted nothing more than to feed on your corpse. The final encounter pitted Samus against a pulsating brain, but the real bad guys were always the Metroid life-forms themselves. It was clear the development team borrowed liberally from Ridley Scott's film Alien, down to the name of one of the game's boss characters, but the game's appropriation of the themes from the Alien series goes deeper than some faux-Giger designs.

The music of the Metroid games remains popular, and many fans continue to release their own versions of the songs

Just as with Ripley in those films, Samus Aran's life became intimately linked with that of the Metroid life-forms. She fought them, and in the series' Game Boy debut she was tasked with hunting them down, but in Super Metroid the last remaining Metroid also saves her from defeat at the hands of Mother Brain. She can't escape them, nor they her. They both share many of the same characteristics: both are violent, capable survivors.

This is perhaps illustrated best in the triumphant Super Metroid, which is considered one of the best games ever made. "What's most impressive about the game is its atmosphere. The Super Nintendo may be woefully underpowered by today's standards, but that hasn't diminished the atmospheric nature of Super Metroid one bit," we wrote in our Masterpiece entry for Super Metroid. "The feeling of being alone on an alien world is incredibly powerful, and this has a lot to do with the game's dark and foreboding soundtrack."

That game added a map, allowing you to better plan your exploration, and it moved the Metroid story along, setting the stage for the most recent game, Metroid: Other M. Super Metroid may have been released near the end of the Super Nintendo's life cycle, but it still found an audience and helped to create the now-ubiquitous "Metroidvania" style of games that combine exploration with action and item collection. The game began with a countdown and a feverish escape, and it never let up until the game's surprising finale. The detailed and fully realized world make this a game that's easy to return to, even for modern gamers.

The Prime series of games took the Metroid world and turned it into something that looked like a first-person shooter. Fans were skeptical. The games remained true to what made Metroid so compelling, however, and they became hits as well. The game curved your view of the action at the edges, making it feel like you were inside the armor, looking out through the eyes of Samus Aran. If anything, this added to the game's claustrophobic feel, and gave you the sense of exploring even more effectively designed environments. You were still alone, you were still fighting the Metroids, and it still felt like an impossible job.

The series also found success on Nintendo's various portable systems, and although some of the games were more linear than others, there has yet to be a single "bad" Metroid. Heck, even the pinball game was good!

Does it matter that Samus Aran is a woman?

The moment that Aran removed her helmet to reveal blonde hair and female form in the first game was a shocker for gamers of the time, but since then her sex has become less of an issue. The fact that no one makes a big deal about Samus Aran being a woman is notable, as is the fact that she's a capable warrior and survivor both in and out of her armor. This changed with the release of Other M on the Nintendo Wii, with many critics annoyed at the decision to "humanize" the character, making her vulnerable and putting the fact she's not a man front and center when she deals with others.

Her existence as a woman never really needed to be explored in depth, and it worked better when simply presented to the gamer as the reality of the situation. There were some undertones of motherhood with her caring for the newborn Metroid from Metroid 2 on the original GameBoy, but again that worked better as an implicit piece of storytelling. Other M felt the need to continually beat you over the head with the fact of Aran's womanhood, and it was a weaker game for it.

The Metroid series contains some of the most influential games ever made. The non-linear gameplay that rewarded exploration and an OCD-like need to find secrets, the different weapons that were stronger or weaker against certain enemies while also changing the environments to allow you access to new areas, and even the realization that adventure games could work in a first-person view... Metroid changed the way we game. It may not be one of the most important games to Nintendo, but is that a bad thing? This isn't a character who needs to be trotted out every year with a new game.

Picked up the Prime Trilogy when it was released for the Wii. Almost a collectors item now - wish I had picked up two.

As for the game itself - absolutely love it. Or at least the part I have managed to play through so far - about 80% in the first series and cannot for the life of me manage to destroy the omega pirate boss.

re: "The Three Metroid Games You Need to Play"Totally agree. Those are the best games in the series. If you play only one game from this series, any of those is a fine choice. If you like 2-D / retro I would pick Zero Mission or Super Metroid and if you like 3-D I would pick Metroid Prime.

Gaming owes much to Samus Aran, and the least we can do is give her a break until she's needed again.

Wow, real powerful stuff there.

Maybe I'm just cranky but this entire article seems like a fluff piece. Yes the Metroid series is great and I don't know why there hasn't been more of the Prime series (considering they are of equal quality to the Halo series and those guys put out 5 games) but does it define a generation? eh.

I like when Ben sticks to game reviews, he kills those. He's gaming version of a human interest story seem like the work of a hack writer.

First time I ever played the original Metroid was probably sometime in early 1988. I borrowed it from my friend over a weekend and spent hours exploring. I'll never forget the the eureka moment I had when it hit me that the bomb-able blocks had a certain look to them and realizing that near the beginning there was a bunch of them in the floor. That of course was the path to Kraid's lair. I rushed back to that area and bombed it out and fell down to the elevator room and descended to Kraid's. This was before I knew much about secrets and "easter eggs" and before I started regularly reading Nintendo Power and EGM (both of which came out later that year I believe), so it was truly a very cool moment, something that I can never recapture.

These days we've got things like GameFaqs and such there's no more sense of mystery and discovery.

picking up metroid 2 for the game boy is one of those few things that make me proud of my 10yo(?) self (even though i just chose it because the cover art looked cool). i still remember the feeling of entering a room and my heartbeat suddenly speed up at the mere sight of a hatched metroid egg... the strongest metroids that came out later in the game scared the hell out of me.

i ended up getting a gamecube mostly thanks to the metroid prime pack, and loved it as well. if i could afford it, getting a wii and the metroid prime triology would have been a no brainer.

I still kick myself for not picking up the Metroid Prime Trilogy when it was in stores for that whole week. Playing Metroid Prime with the Wii controller would be pretty nice.

It was available for longer than a week. I wasn't originally going to get it, then a local Toys 'R Us had its annual "buy two get one free" sale on games, so I picked it up.

Actually, I was playing through Prime 1 (and the beginning of Prime 2) between the time my desktop PC died two weeks ago and its replacement arrived Monday this week.

One thing that I keep forgetting is that it no longer shoots directly at the center of the screen when locked on. Also, the Wave Beam charge shot will curve to hit enemies that try to dodge, a bit like missiles do.

Also, for whatever reason, even in North America, the European version of the base game was used. This is most evident when I was trying to track down a piece of missing Pirate Data and the guide I was checking had one that I couldn't find in the room it was listed in. Turns out the Pirate Data pieces talking about the final boss don't exist in the European/Trilogy version, and the piece I missed was elsewhere.

Relatively open exploration of an eery space station. The feeling of being alone and trying to explore your surroundings piecing together a story?

System Shock! (and esp. System Shock 2 one of the best games ever made)

Its beyond sad that Looking Glass died. They have a huge chunk out of my best games ever list.

Ultima Underworld 1: so far better than anything else at that time console or PC. It was 1992 for gods sake.System Shock 1+2: blowing any metroids out of the waterThief 1: One of the best games ever made.

I really enjoy the type of game/story where you get to a planet and you know something bad happened. Metroid did it really well in the 4 games I played (original ,game boy, super, one of the Wii ones). Walking around seeing the ruins of an advanced civilization with overgrowth but still having missiles and energy tanks was great.

Sort of like in Alien, when you see the space jockey with a big hole in its chest... you knew something bad happened and wondered what it was. Or Aliens where they get to LV426 and the colonists are all missing and there's huge acid holes.

I'd like to add one moment from Metroid Prime 3: The death screen.Samus is dead. Blood dribbles down her cracked visor. The freaky moment is when you realize that you never left 1st person, and you're still looking out of her dead eyes. Other games eventually go black, this one doesn't, not until you quit or restart.

- I remember calling Nintendo regularly asking when Metroid was going to get a sequel for a long time. - I remember being a little disappointed that it was released on the Game Boy, but the Super Game Boy fixed that. - Super Metroid is the only Metroid that I have replayed to the end. Multiple times.- I never finished Prime 1 on the Cube because my Cube would lock up during some elevator sequences...- I am borrowing Trilogy right now.- As of a few months ago the KMart near my house still had a new in box copy of trilogy. I really should consider getting it if I can somehow sneak it past my wife... Those reward points from Sears may come in handy yet.- Own Prime 2 but have yet to actually play it.- Own Hunters - ditto- Pinball is one of my go to games on the DS to this day.

I have to say Super Metroid and Link to the Past are my favorites of the SNES. Actually, I think they are in my top 5 across all platforms permanently. Hint: only two Zeldas make my list and none were released after Past.

Other M had some glitch that could ruin your save, if I recall correctly. Other M also had the distinction of having cheat protections (e.g. anti-infinite ammo) despite being a single-player, offline game.

These days we've got things like GameFaqs and such there's no more sense of mystery and discovery.

Are you forced to use FAQs and walkthroughs? I save those for when I have a game that I am trying to get 100% on, and finally give up on the few remaining things that are now making the game frustrating versus fun (like pigeon killing in GTA4).

As a side note, if anyone is longing for some metroid like action, if you haven't played shadow complex, it it a sweet game, and any metroid fan would feel comfortable playing it (even if it takes place on earth).

Damn you! After Super Metroid was claimed a classic I went back and played it. Now after seeing that picture, I need to go through the original again. I'll be using Netsopia this time, after learning about how important cycle accuracy is to emulation in a recent article. Can't wait!

Damn you! After Super Metroid was claimed a classic I went back and played it. Now after seeing that picture, I need to go through the original again. I'll be using Netsopia this time, after learning about how important cycle accuracy is to emulation in a recent article. Can't wait!

I tried to play the original again just recently, but after being spoiled by Metroid: Zero Mission, I don't really want to go back to the original.

Yeah Zero Mission to me is the better game as it addresses a lot of the NES shortcomings. I still think Super Metroid has possibly the best boss battle in history if only because of the Metroid coming back to make you the ultimate badass. The power I felt as my shots knocked Mother Brains head back were awesome. Truly one of the greatest games ever made in my opinion.

I picked up terreria this week, and it feels more like a metroid game than any other metroid-vania style game in years. The problem with metroidvania games is that you know the formula. explore, get new weapons, weapons open areas that weren't accessable earlier, use weapons to find secret areas.

This was a concept that was fairly unworn when Super Metroid came out, and super metroid solidified the formula to such a degree that games nearly 20 years later are using the exact same formula, with rare deviation.

I bring up Terreria however, because it feels more like that "uh, what am i doing, where am i going, why? Holy crap this place i'm in is scary and weird." that is missing from all metroidvania style games, such as "Insanely twisted shadow planet" and "shadow complex". This is the feeling that made super metroid so awesome in the early 90's.

Metroid really should be ended as a series, unless they plan on expanding the style of game it is. Metroid, with it's Kraid, Ridley, mother brain and metroid encounters are worn and broken. I know super missiles come after missiles, i'll be getting bombs, the ball, blah blah blah. That's not exploration, it's a checklist.

From metroid to super metroid, there was a leap b/c there was just a lot more of the good stuff...super bombs, super missles, layering weapon types together, super running/jumping, etc. But some of the metroid games did just turn into a rehash of the former...same powerups, almost near-same exploration and events (with just different creatures or bosses). They find ways to keep making it fresh, but it could use a new ... I don't know... *something* to make it stand out again.

When I first played metroid, I liked it b/c there was hardly any story, and it was just this lone bounty hunter out there kicking butt and taking names with this super-adaptive survival suit. Then nintendo got all anal about adding back story and her being part of some alliance group and other crap. It was just ... well, it was just more spectacular when she was seen as some lone deus ex swooping in from unknown places to save the day rather than just one part of many from some combat faction. I liked thinking her suit was some super, other-world technology that was so advanced it could absorb/adapt to old tech and bio-tech alike. It was all really fascinating to a kid growing up.

These days, I keep waiting for nintendo to jump the shark and make some multiplayer metroid game where you and friends all in survival suits that do different things go kill stuff ala HALO fashion. IE: take her originality, and make her not-so-original by making more people in suits like hers.

Gaming owes much to Samus Aran, and the least we can do is give her a break until she's needed again.

Wow, real powerful stuff there.

Maybe I'm just cranky but this entire article seems like a fluff piece. Yes the Metroid series is great and I don't know why there hasn't been more of the Prime series (considering they are of equal quality to the Halo series and those guys put out 5 games) but does it define a generation? eh.

I like when Ben sticks to game reviews, he kills those. He's gaming version of a human interest story seem like the work of a hack writer.

You expect hard core investigative journalism....about Metroid? Kinda hard to differentiate "fluff" from anything else when one spends this much time reading about a bourgeois leisure activity like gaming. (I say that as an admitted bourgeois gamer).

They can't all be reviews talking about how much X new game sucks, nor would I want them to be. Particularly as gaming ages and crosses into multiple generations, it's beneficial and entertaining to talk about the more notable events in gaming history. This franchise counts by any reasonable measure.

I still kick myself for not picking up the Metroid Prime Trilogy when it was in stores for that whole week. Playing Metroid Prime with the Wii controller would be pretty nice.

I managed to get my hands on a pristine copy of Trilogy back in 2009. I HATED the controls. Not being able to turn around quickly was maddening. after spending 30+ hours playing those games, and I sold them out of frustration.

After all this, I think it's time that Nintendo embrace the inevitable sequel post-Fusion. Keep the Omega Fusion suit (at least until it's convenient to replace in game), and start things fresh without having to constrain yourself as prequel to anything.

Oh yeah, and a 3D render of the Fusion suit that that doesn't suck. Need ideas? Look at the Light Suit from Prime 2.

It is this franchise which prevents me from selling my Wii. When Retro took the previous two Metroid Prime games and applied the Wii controls to them, well, that's all it took, really.

Oddly enough, I've played every game except The Other M (and I won't because of the fact Samus has a voice, damn it). I despised Super Metroid and am probably the only Metroid fan who does. Although I did love the new abilities in the game, I felt the mechanics of the game tried too desperately to incorporate them, and it blew when certain things just didn't go well.

When I heard Metroid Prime would be based on Super Metroid, I refused to buy it. The GCN was the second Nintendo console I wouldn't purchase and nothing on it would change my mind. Then, someone gave me the game and the console as a gift.

Metroid Prime still remains the best game I've ever played despite a rough start into the 3D world. While many chastised the second in the series of 3 for its difficulty, I loved how challenging it was. It hurts me even still the Wii version was "pulled back" to remove this difficulty (Master Quest edition, anyone?).

Unfortunately, my relationship with Nintendo has come at an end. Even if Retro should return for the Wii U and deliver another game, I'm tired of Nitendo's bullshit of telling us what we want. Now, they can "print money" with someone else (with Apple, given the ironic way it runs its business as well).

Let's hope this franchise stays retired forever, if only I don't feel the need to want to play a game on a console made by a company I no longer respect.